Hogwarts Apartments
by boshrocks
Summary: inspired by Ladyfirehair's star trek story 'Enterprise Apartments'. AU normal world. What with the divorce and everything, to Hermione, Hogwarts Apartments had seemed like a blessing in disguise. That is, if it weren't for one particular neighbour...


Hogwarts Apartments had seemed like a godsend to Hermione Granger. What with the divorce and everything she needed a break.

He was rich already and yet he had got the house and all the money out of the marriage. And she'd had to pay him alimony. That hadn't seemed fair to Hermione. It had made the headlines too and magazines and newspapers were always calling her asking for an interview. That wasn't surprising really; her ex was a famous footballer.

Therefore when Mr Dumbledore, the complex landlord, had given her a cracking deal on the place, she took it willingly. He was a sweet old man with a Moses beard and a twinkle in his clear blue eyes, but he warned her than any Gandalf jokes would result in her rent shooting up sky high.

He had also warned her that she should expect all her neighbours to be very friendly, and that this was just one of those places where your business was everyone else's business and theirs was yours. But he was assured that she would be able to cope with the other nut jobs who lived there.

Mr Dumbledore, it seemed, only took on tenants who were interesting in some way. But they all seemed nice enough as the men helped her move what little furniture Viktor had left her in the divorce into the little flat.

The ladies hung back and supplied fresh iced lemonade. They left the heavy lifting to the 'menfolk', as the pretty redhead put it, because their job on a moving day was Supervising. This caused the other three redheads in the group glare at her and try to bully her into helping with the heavy lifting.

"What's their deal?" Hermione asked the blonde hippie who was threatening to paint sunflowers onto the plain walls.

"Ginny's their sister. Don't you see it?" she replied dreamily.

Now that she knew, Hermione could indeed see the family resemblance. Freckles, ginger hair, blue eyes, and blushing ears. They didn't all live together, apparently; the twins Fred and George lived in the flat above Hermione's while their younger siblings Ron and Ginny lived together across the hall from her. The twins owned a joke shop and were apparently big pranksters. The hippie warned her to look out for their pranks, since they were known to test out their inventions on the others in the apartments. Ginny was a love guru for a glamour magazine and Ron was a sports agent who had apparently only just missed his shot at being the goalkeeper on the national football team.

Luna, the blonde hippie, lived on the floor below Hermione in the flat next to Neville, the rather pathetic man who was clearly about to drop her television. Luna edited a wacky magazine called the Quib or something and spent a lot of the supposed supervising time informing her of all the imps that were making everyone's brains turn to mush. Neville was a botanist and the greenhouse behind the building belonged to him. He was adorably honest and reminded Hermione of a floppy eared puppy she had once owned. Apparently Luna had a crush on him, if the way she was always devouring him with her eyes was anything to go by.

On one side of her was the handsome Harry, who was apparently a player when he wasn't a detective. Hermione liked him though; he had a noble quality to him and she could tell he was a good guy. He was very kind to her and Hermione got the impression he wanted to protect everyone from everything. Ginny said he was a bit of a hero, or at least he thought he was, in fact it was a full blown complex, and that he enjoyed the attention he got from women a lot more than he probably should.

But, according to Ginny, he wasn't as big a player as the man in the flat the other side of Hermione. This one was blond but was not related to Luna. Hermione took one look at him and immediately summed him up as a spoilt rich boy who thought he was god's gift but was in fact an arrogant prat. His name was Draco and he was a bigshot corporate lawyer or something in the city. He had a charming smile and could flirt for England, but there was a horrible smugness about his smirk. Hermione tried to ignore the fact that it was an unbelievably sexy smirk and that it sent tingles straight to her pelvic area whenever it was directed at her. Which was a hell of a lot on moving day. He and Harry seemed a little anti each other, and Neville, who had been at boarding school with both of them, informed her that they had been rivals in practically everything since the first day of school. She at once decided she would be on Harry's side if she ever got roped into a squabble.

Ernie and Lavender, the couple that lived on the floor below Hermione, were absent. Ginny informed her that they were having trouble and were forced to marriage counselling four hours a day. Ginny didn't seem to think that was a bad thing, and Ron, who was passing, agreed heartily. Hermione shot a curious look to Harry, who told her that Lavender had had a relationship with Ron shortly before she married Ernie and had never quite got over him. Apparently she was still trying to coerce him into an affair. But Ron had been best man at their wedding, having known Ernie for longer from public school, and wouldn't betray him like that.

The other set of twins that lived on the floor above Hermione, Indian Padma and Parvati were away with their airline; they were air hostesses and their plane wouldn't come in for a few more nights. The elusive and apparently heavenly Cedric had yet to show since he was a male model/actor and was away on a shoot. He sounded like a bit of a douchebag to Hermione.

Hermione liked them, all except Draco. The first thing he did when they met was hit on her. Handsome though he was Hermione had rejected him rather harshly and had sparked their very first argument. She felt sure that it would only be a matter of time before she lost it and hit him.

Things soon fell into a pattern in the apartments. Hermione was a novelist and spent pretty much all of her time in her apartment, typing away on her typewriter, or sitting in the little garden on a sunny day with the typewriter or notebook on her lap. Neville was usually out there when she was, repotting some flowers or tending to the lawn. Clumsy though he was, Hermione found him incredibly sweet and a gentle soul.

Ginny and Luna quickly became her closest friends, as the only girls in the 'neighbourhood' at the time and all being writers, they hung together and Hermione enjoyed all their girly talks. But she had to admit that after a while the girly stuff got too much. Besides Ginny just couldn't resist analysing every little detail about her divorce and threatened to set her up on numerous blind dates to get her back on track. Apparently she had a lot of exes.

That was where Harry and Ron came in. They sympathised with her plight and provided the solidarity and sanity she needed. Ron, who obviously knew all the details of her divorce, wanted to talk about nothing but relationships. It transpired that he was gay and was madly in love with Harry but Harry didn't swing that way and evidently he didn't know about the way Ron felt and apparently wasn't even aware that he was homosexual. Hermione promised to help Ron, although she didn't quite know how she could help.

There had been a little confusion concerning Ron's sexuality and his previous relationship with Lavender, but he cleared that up by telling her firmly that Lavender had scared him off women for life. They were great as friends but not as girlfriends.

The fights with Draco became an everyday occurrence and soon turned into a running joke in the complex. Hermione and Draco could fight over anything and fought over everything. Everything that man did annoyed her. He flirted madly with her but then she would hear him having loud, clearly mind-blowing sex through the wall between their bedrooms. A lot. Ginny was right when she said Draco was a player. That guy brought home several different girls a week. He knew Hermione could hear them through the wall and the next morning he would be wearing the smuggest smirk on the face of the earth.

And what annoyed her most about him was that her heart fluttered whenever he smirked at her. She could get lost in his grey eyes far too easily. When they weren't yelling at each other she saw his softer side. He was incredibly smart, much like she was, and they could occasionally have decent and deep talks about current events, which usually developed into healthy debates about politics or literature. It was at times like that when he seemed almost human. Almost.

At the complex barbeques for example, a tradition for Sunday lunch in the summer, she noted that he paid for all the food since he was the richest one in the block, and that he cooked the meat, uncaring that he looked ridiculous in one of Luna's frilly pink aprons, and that he kept himself busy making sure that everyone had enough food. While he did pick on Neville quite a bit, he did replace the greenhouse and everything in it when some of the local kids smashed the glass.

Hermione tried to tell herself that she was angry at him for throwing his money around like that and that his cons far outweighed his pros. But then her logical brain told her that he was the richest person in the complex and that he really had done a nice thing for Neville; the poor boy couldn't live without that greenhouse.

One thing Hermione couldn't understand was, if Draco had all that money, why wasn't he living in some penthouse flat somewhere in the rich part of the city? Why was he even living in Hogwarts Apartments? No one knew, not even Ginny who was the resident expert on everyone else's business. Mr Dumbledore refused to tell her, saying it was Draco's business. Harry offered to do some snooping but didn't promise anything. Evidently he had tried before and failed miserably.

Then Hermione witnessed something which shed some light on his situation. She was working in the garden when the sounds of Draco shouting floated out from the building.

A moment later he stormed out of the building yelling into his blackberry.

"No father I will not sign it. I don't care what that bitch says, she is not getting her hands on my money. She's my ex and I'll call her whatever the hell I want. You know what a bitch Pansy is, just as well as I do. I don't know why you made me marry her in the first place. Connections! Is that a good enough reason to force your son into an arranged marriage to a girl he has hated since they were kids? I didn't think so. And about the Zambini settlement; no way will I accept that. Screw you, Malfoy Manor house was left to me by grandfather. Blaise is not getting his mitts on it. I don't care if he is my oldest friend; he's already got four houses. You know why I live here, don't pretend you don't. Yeah whatever." Without even saying goodbye, Draco hung up, and looked very much like he would like to smash that very expensive blackberry.

Grunting in anger he turned to go back inside and caught Hermione looking at him.

"What?" he asked rudely.

"Nothing." She lowered her eyes, well aware that his were still on her.

"Look, what you just overheard-"

"Is your business, not mine." She finished, gently interrupting.

He smiled gratefully. "I bet you've got questions."

"I do, but they'll keep until you're ready to talk about them. You don't have to, but sometimes it helps. Sounds like you've got issues with your dad."

"Understatement." Draco sat on the grass beside her.

"What's he like?"

"He's like me, only without a heart. Bigshot CEO. Malfoy Inc. Family business you might say."

"And you fell out with him because you don't want to join the family business?"

"Even worse. I work for his rivals."

"From what I know of your father's company, and from the picture I have of your father, you're playing with fire. Deliberately antagonising him like that?"

"It's my job to. Ever since I was little I disagreed with his policies, and the way he dealt with people. He always expected me to be like him, and in a way I am."

"It's my policy that you can be whoever you want to be. No one else has the right to tell you who you are, only you know that. If people try to rule your life, something must be missing from their own."

"Very wise. What magazine did you read that in?"

"Hey, I'm trying to help."

"I know. Sorry."

"What about Pansy?"

"Arranged marriage for a family alliance. She's a right cow, I've never been able to stand her. She has a voice that shatters glass."

"How long were you married?"

"Three years that felt like a lifetime. She painted the whole house pink so I let her have it."

"I didn't have a choice in my divorce. He could afford better lawyers so he got everything, and alimony."

"Who was he?"

"Viktor Krum. Relationship, headlines. Marriage, headlines. Divorce, headlines. New girlfriend, headlines."

"I remember. You were the wronged party, him having cheated on you, and yet his PR people made you the bad guy."

"I might do like Ron and swear off the opposite sex."

It was a joke but he looked at her with complete seriousness. "Don't do that." He said quietly.

She looked at him, and the look he returned was such an honest one that she regretted making the half-hearted joke.

Mr Dumbledore shuffled out of the building with a large package in his arms. "Hermione, dear, this came for you. You weren't in your flat."

"It's one of the last good days we'll have this year, I thought I'd work outside." She got up and took the package from him. "Thank you."

"Your new book I imagine."

"They always send me several copies before it's released."

"When's the release day?" Draco asked.

"Halloween. Ironic, considering it's a horror."

"Clever marketing. Everyone wants a fright on Halloween and something new should sell like hot cakes."

Hermione chuckled. "I suppose. It's not much good, though."

"Let me read it and I'll be the judge of that."

"I'll bring a copy round later. I need to inspect it first."

Draco insisted on paying for the book although she insisted he didn't need to. They chatted for a while, when she delivered it to him, until she saw his costume for the block Halloween party hanging on a door.

"A vampire? That's original."

"Hey don't diss it. What you going as?"

"I, um, don't know yet."

"It's tomorrow night."

"Yeah I know that. But Ginny and Luna vetoed my choice and you know them, they won't take no for an answer."

"So they're getting your costume? Oh this'll end well."

Hermione simply glared.

Draco sniggered as he heard the excited squeals coming from Hermione's apartment. But none of them sounded like they came from Hermione. In fact Draco was sure he could hear a distinct banging on the wall and shouts of "Harry! Help!"

That made him laugh. Poor Hermione.

A little while later he hung around in the garden, observing the decorations and party lights the twins had put up for the holiday. The party was in full swing and yet Hermione hadn't come down yet.

He thought he saw her peeking round the doorframe. He smiled and sauntered over to her.

"Coming out then?"

"In this getup? No way."

"Come on, it can't be that bad."

"I'll catch my death of cold."

"No you won't. Get cold and I'll lend you my cloak."

"Very sweet of you, but I rather think that when you see my costume you won't feel like covering me up."

"Come on. Stop being a wimp and come and have fun."

Rolling her eyes she stepped out into the porch light. Draco's eyes nearly fell out of his head. She was dressed in Star Wars' Leia in that gold bikini.

"I don't know what they did to persuade you to wear that but I'm bloody glad they did."

She giggled and blushed. "I don't know how they got me into it either."

The garden chorused with wolf whistles as the rest of the residents noticed her. Harry approached and made her give him a twirl, running his hand around her bare waist. Draco's face clouded and he looked very much like he would like to beat the living daylights out of Harry.

"Oh Harry, stop being silly." She batted his hand away, looking pleased nevertheless.

She turned back to Draco to find that he was smirking rather smugly at her.

"What are you looki-"

She was cut off by his lips crashing down over hers.

From somewhere nearby there were cheers and definite cries of "Finally!"

He pulled away a little. "I've been wanting to do that since I met you." He whispered against her lips.

"What took you so long?"

He laughed and pulled her in for another kiss.

"Am I missing something here?" Cedric asked Ron, who chuckled and patted him on the shoulder.

"Just focus on your next photoshoot."

"Ron, could I have a word with you please?" Harry asked.

Later, when they returned from the dark corner of the garden, Ron was wearing the biggest grin ever and Harry looked remarkably pleased with himself.


End file.
